A nutritionist straight up told me no meat. I can’t live with no meat. If you don’t eat meat what types of things do you make? So far I’ve been doing salads, nuts, steaming broccoli, peppers, and carrots. I have fruit too, oats and almond milk. I’m in need of ideas. I’m one of those I’ll eat it over and over again people. I’m also going to Google it as well.
Get a second opinion from a qualified professional. I am not a qualified professional.
IMO any nutritionist that tells you to stop eating meat all together is pushing their own agenda. Sure, cut back on meat, but meat has a ton of nutrients. Just cut back and eat lean cuts.
I hope they at least gave info on the types of nutrients you will need to make sure to increase in your diet or take a supplement for if you stop eating meat. Iron comes to mind right away.
Anecdotally - I got a dramatic decrease in “bad” cholesterol with one 36 hour fast a week, and no other changes to diet, no change in my weight (I am not overweight). The daily 16/8, 18/6, 20/4 thing I do now is more comfortable but cholesterol back up, weight a little lower.
Dietary cholesterol doesn’t necessarily raise your blood cholesterol, it’s more complicated than that. Sugar can raise your blood cholesterol, as can stress.
You can try the not eating meat. But eating more other sources of fat (olives, avocado, nuts, fatty fish) and adding a long fast each week might work better.
I don’t think JUST removing meat would work unless you replace it with good fats though. Like if you remove meat and replace it with pretzels you will make it worse.
Oh, and since you asked - most of the food I like isn’t meat - when you remove meat from a diet for most people that’s just taking out chickens, cows, and pigs and leaving literally every other food in the world. All the vegetables, greens, pasta, nuts, olives, fruits, beans, all the grains and also milk and dairy and eggs. We eat beans and rice and greens a lot, burritos, stir fries, rice bowls. Eggs and beans and potatoes. Avocado toast is so good with cream cheese and sprouts. You can have an enormously varied and wonderful diet without meat. I just don’t think it will fix your cholesterol.
My mom went vegan for a year based on her Drs recommendation. It didn’t do anything for her cholesterol. There’s research out there that shows the connection between cholesterol and insulin raising foods. https://youtu.be/dRBYeViQG7Y
Since starting IF in January, I have actually increased my meat consumption. I cook lean ground turkey, chicken, and salmon. No beef or pork. It helps me to eat fewer carbs and stay full longer.
I still make vegetarian meals though. Ways you can incorporate protein to your diet is with edamame, black beans, kidney beans, lentils, tofu, tempeh, and chia seeds. You can also make smoothies with protein powder. I enjoy Orgain Organic protein powder, and it’s made from pea, brown rice, and chia seeds. I eat two meals a day and my first meal is usually a huge smoothie made with it, PB2 peanut butter powder, almond milk, banana, a couple of spoonful’s of low sugar vanilla Greek yogurt, and ice.
My brother cut out all meat products (meat and dairy and eggs)in his late 20s due to a high cholesterol scare. He loves his Whole Foods plant based diet so much now, that 5 years later he’s still doing it, and his numbers are phenomenal. I’ve also started it now because my numbers are also bad.
High colesterol (LDL and triglycerides) Is caused by excessive carbs… Meat and saturated fats has barely impact on it…Also high LDL is barely correlated with any disease, causation is not proven at all…Triglycerides on the other hand are bad and caused by too much carbs. Eat all the meat you want because being realistic those are the only real sources of nutrition we are able to use, vegetables and such don’t provide nutrition at all, fruits are in the middle.
High colesterol (LDL and triglycerides) Is caused by excessive carbs… Meat and saturated fats has barely impact on it…Also high LDL is barely correlated with any disease, causation is not proven at all…Triglycerides on the other hand are bad and caused by too much carbs. Eat all the red meat you want because being realistic those are the only real sources of nutrition we are able to use as humans, vegetables and such don’t provide nutrition at all, fruits are in the middle.
Never trust in “professionals” who make you cut out an entire block of food. There’s perfectly good clean meat cuts to eat. I don’t know how is in your country but in mine we need to go to a few because we’re the second country in the world with more eating disorders and you’ll have this people becoming nutricionists and tell you things like you don’t have to eat fruit because it has sugar.
Get a second opinion and meanwhile you can stick to fish and chicken breast with no skin if you’re not in the best level of cholesterol, until you meet with another professional
Google vegetarian sources of protein.
If she meant no meat as in “no animal muscle” that still leaves:-egg, yogurt/milk/cheese, beans, legumes, lentils, etc.
You might also want to clarify if she also meant no fish when she said no meat…some people don’t always include fish in that category.
Honestly I’m a little surprised your nutritionist said something that restrictive given how you describe your knowledge on the matter without educating you what your diet needs to consist of.
My doctor looked at my cholesterol numbers and said pretty much the same thing. It took some time to get serious about IF again because of holidays and winter blues, but I just got going with it a couple weeks ago. I’m hoping I can get retested over the summer and have better results.
My advice… although probably not the greatest… try IF for a few months with no diet change and see if things change. That’s my plan. If I need statins, so be it. I’m not giving up all meat though.
I eat skinless chicken, cod, salmon, scallops, squid & shrimp. (And portabella “burgers”) These proteins help me with satiety. I read the book Wheat Belly years ago re: the effects of wheat on cholesterol and gave up wheat. :)